


try and grab the spotlight (a dollop of fame)

by earnmysong



Series: let me hold your crown, babe [4]
Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: F/M, FAMILYYYYYY, Future Fic, Gen, Hamilton - Freeform, Kid Fic, M/M, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Musical Theater Appreciation, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-22
Updated: 2020-07-22
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:46:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25450072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/earnmysong/pseuds/earnmysong
Summary: Lennox greets Alexis at dismissal on the Monday of a week that’s going to be truly heinous, work-wise, with: “Mommy, I have a surprise for you! [...] We’re doing Hamilton for Theater Arts, and I’m Eliza!”Otherwise known as: Alexis watches her daughter become, like, the greatest star! [Post-Series]
Relationships: Alexis Rose & David Rose, Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Stevie Budd & Alexis Rose, Theodore "Ted" Mullens/Alexis Rose
Series: let me hold your crown, babe [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1760443
Comments: 14
Kudos: 35





	try and grab the spotlight (a dollop of fame)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [firstaudrina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/firstaudrina/gifts), [irishmizzy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/irishmizzy/gifts).



> This is for my lovelies @firstaudrina and @irishmizzy/@megalong! Both of them encourage - when they could very easily dismiss - my sometimes one-track heart and mind! @firstaudrina suggested: _Perhaps another dose of Stevie? I love Stevie and Alexis interacting and I truly do not know how Stevie would talk to a child, but I'd love to find out!_ What you'll find below is where my brain ran within those parameters! 
> 
> There's an excessive amount of _Hamilton_ in here, and this is oodles longer than my attention span normally permits: I have feelingssssss about Alexis and Ted - now, forever, until I leave this earth *ahem* - and I've elected to leave my work email unopened for this entire week, for reasons of: YIKESSSSSSS. Also? I know Eliza's a brunette and Lennox is a blonde. Wigs are hot and bulky, though, and hair comes up a lot in this? So i took some creative liberties :D.
> 
> A massive thank you to @irishmizzy/@megalong - who not only provided her usual excellent beta services but also threw so much proverbial spaghetti at the wall with me! 
> 
> _Schitt's Creek_ belongs to the brilliant Family Levy et al., _Hamilton_ belongs to global treasure Lin-Manuel Miranda, and all other media referenced belongs to whoever it should. The title is very obviously borrowed from 'Helpless'.

\----

Lennox greets Alexis at dismissal on the Monday of a week that’s going to be truly heinous, work-wise, with: “Mommy, I have a surprise for you!” 

Motherhood has highlighted a bunch of really useful stuff for Alexis – most of which she never would’ve guessed she’d need to know or keep in her back pocket in case of emergencies. On page two of this gigantic ‘tiny human textbook’ – which, around Len’s first birthday, had officially outgrown its charmingly vintage binder and transitioned to more of, like, a mental collection? Surprises from a small child, although awesome in theory, are also extremely capable of being, like, terrifying as hell. She rapidly weighs how much sleep she actually requires to function at her sparkling _team lead who also happens to be CEO of a thriving side-hustle_ best against the hours she’ll most likely get: a number that depends on the shock value of Len’s secret.

“You and Elodie didn’t try to pull off another dye job during recess, did you?” Alexis reaches to run her fingers through Len’s loose hair, inspecting the ends for any hints of a color change - even though her daughter’s already denying a sequel. Stylistic courage deserves to be celebrated, and Overtone is the strongest chemical with which third-grade members of the Rose-Mullens household are approved to experiment. {A few months ago, though, Alexis’ mini mastermind had been hit with a lovely little lightning bolt: throwing the previous Easter’s leftover egg tablets into the mix would maximize the luster quotient. She and her best friend had definitely achieved the new looks they’d been aiming for. Great for them, you know? The only issue? They’d also succeeded in, like, making over all visible sections of themselves - plus half of the girls’ bathroom down the hall from their class.} 

“No, like, discoveries of almost-dead pigeons during gym today?” Spinning Len around, Alexis carefully - and with as much zen as she can channel - unzips her backpack, fully expecting the frustrated flap of confined wings and the sharp bite of a beak. Macaroni must not have any relatives in the area, though, because there’s not even a feather to be found, thank God.

“This won’t scare you, I swear.” Len twirls back toward Alexis, grinning. “We’re doing _Hamilton_ for Theater Arts, and I’m Eliza!” 

“Oh, yay!” Alexis applauds enthusiastically and, dropping to her daughter’s level, trades nose boops with her. Then, all of a sudden, Len fits herself against Alexis, Alexis’ heart cycles through its typical four-somersault reaction to unsolicited cuddles, and she immediately brings in an affectionate hug of her own. “Um, look at you, my snazzy little starlet!” Len dips into an adorable curtsy, straightens to scatter invisible paparazzi with an intimidating glare. “Seriously, sunshine? This is super exciting!” As they head home, she bumps shoulders with Len. “So. It’s too early to ask for an autograph, right?”

“You’re my publicist, Mommy. Obviously, I’ll give you first dibs. You always have to include signing bonuses.”

Alexis bursts out laughing at how easily that slides out of Len’s mouth. “Well, you’re definitely off to, like, a terrific start in the perks department, boss.” Len giggles and Alexis contemplates what other tips her daughter has gathered from trips to the Interflix offices and inadvertent audits of ARC meetings. 

She should probably, like, investigate that. 

\---- 

Alexis sips her post-jog violet drink and thanks Sascha for sitting for them so early on a weekend.

Alexis and Ted’s teenage neighbor appears at six sharp pretty much every Saturday morning unless the world has, like, decided to explode for some reason that means they’re missing their workout. Or, like, their alarm goes through so many snoozes that they don’t feel like horrendous parents for dragging Len along. Over the years, Alexis has corrected some of the blatant errors in her mother’s judgement: Sascha always being around awards her more brownie points, not more chores. Also? Gratitude’s never better left to the imagination. 

While Ted pays Sascha, Alexis unclips her phone and scrolls through her inbox, her expression clouding over when she lands on an interesting message. 

“Lennox Daveigh Mullens!” Alexis huffs. “What’re the rules about the Apple Pay?”

“Triple threat. Nice!” Ted chuckles. “What’d she do?” Alexis holds her screen out farther for him. 

Sascha pockets her money. “I don’t think she’ll hear you unless you’re louder. She’s deep into her research. Lots of A. Ham and, weirdly, something about critically-acclaimed sushi?” She shrugs, yelling ‘Bye, Len!’ as she leaves.

“You’re pissed about twenty bucks, Lex?” 

Alexis’ million password updates will conveniently click up again and, like, problem solved. So, nope. Not a huge deal. She’ll be keeping Len out of that loop, though. Currently? She’s the slightest bit preoccupied because –

“Not the price, babe.” She taps twice, ballooning the bolded title. “What she bought.” 

Ted glances where she’s gesturing, joy widening his eyes, like, a worrying amount. “ _I’ve_ never even been allowed to experience the splendor!”

“Unfortunately, those particular viewing restrictions will only be relaxed over my dead body. You’re free to, you know, choose.” 

“No contest!” Ted accentuates his compliment – hello, hell of an intimately warm whisper - by fixing his mouth effortlessly to hers and, for a teensy sec, Alexis for real forgets what had compelled her husband to strike up this insanely enjoyable slice of bliss.

“I have a few, um – ” she backs out of the circle of Ted’s arms, touching her hair dreamily and fighting to focus on an intelligent idea “ – things to discuss with Len. So. Yeah. That’s happening.” 

\----

As soon as Alexis notices the rehearsal Len’s running out of her room, she retreats and peeks around the doorframe, aiming her camera at the action. She would rather die than disturb this whole situation - not when it’s shooting off all kinds of _possibly the cutest little scene you’ve watched in your freaking life_ vibes. No way will her willpower let her ignore the opportunity to document, though.

Len’s centered on her rug, rocking her ‘donut disturb until after coffee’ pajama bottoms and Rose Apothecary tee. She fans her fingers to either side, then flares her flannel pants out from her legs – they’re standing in for an elaborate blue dress as best they can - and wiggles her waist while she tracks the melody piping through her AirPods: “Boy, you got me helpless.”

Honestly? Alexis could just, like, melt into a puddle right here. She ends the recording before the video can catch her bawling.

“Mommy?” Len gently puts Ted’s phone on her nightstand before rushing over to Alexis. “Are you okay?” 

“Sure!” Alexis dabs at her eyes with the sleeve of her performance fleece. “Completely fine! I - um - just wanted to check in with you for, like, a quick minute. You were busy, though, and I didn’t want to interrupt. I was waiting and you were amazing and I was, like, beyond happy so - um - ” 

“You’re crying?” Len’s hands rest on her hips as she checks Alexis for signs of distress and struggles to pop this confusing puzzle into place.

“Grown-ups have issues?” Alexis explains. “Can you take five?” 

“Yep!” Skipping back inside, Len flops into her neon-lime beanbag chair from Twy - a close cousin of the plastic disc seats outside the rooms at the flagship Rosebud - and Alexis pretzels herself on the carpet.

“So. _A Little Bit Alexis_ is, like - ”

“Off-limits,” Len recites.

“Mmhmm, exactly! Somehow, though, the entire series downloaded to our library? Crazy, huh?”

Len inhales, ready to defend her inner barricades. “You told me to ask Bijou if I had questions – ”

Alexis bites the inside of her cheek to hold in in her snort, smiling softly at her daughter’s earnest little pout. “You’re okay to just call her Grandma, sunshine. Really. She loves you too much to stay mad for very long. That storm’ll blow over in forty-eight hours, tops." Len’s open-mouthed stare, like, very effectively manages to inform her mother of her lunacy and also berate her for undermining the enormity of this reveal. “Yes, sorry! Sorry! So you - um - you called Grandma and - ”

“Something about _avoiding, at all costs, the fiendish executives who wish for nothing as zealously as to dine on the purity of the unsuspecting ingenue’s most fervent aspirations, purloining their iridescence so that they themselves may sustain their hubris_? Oh! And that your _program represents the summit, if one were to endeavor to arrange the snares of renown by egregiousness_ "?

“Isn’t that fantastic?” Alexis snarls irritably.

“I couldn’t really understand what Grandma was saying, but none of it sounded very nice? So I listened to the theme song without playing any episodes.” In the wake of Len’s protective instincts igniting and the fact that she’s offering up the empty spongy space next to her, a sentimental monsoon threatens to, once again, fog Alexis’ vision. She switches spots, blinking away the moisture. “Plus, Eliza beatboxes, right?" Squeezing Len fondly, Alexis nods. “When Grandma tried to keep up with me? She went all blue! Like a raspberry Sour Patch Kid. Grandpa promised I didn’t kill her, though!”

\----

Later, the Rose-Mullens fam - party of four; aging fuzzy nuggets named Tamagotchi matter too - snuggles cozily together in Alexis and Ted’s bed, watching a movie. 

{Len had lobbied for LMM’s history-infused masterpiece - Alexis couldn’t really blame her; also, duh! - but eight is, like, sort of young for the fully-loaded version. Alexis had expertly averted armageddon, though, by dangling the maestro’s involvement in an equally entertaining evolution.} 

As Maui adds neat art of Moana to his ink, Alexis’ phone rings. When she slides to answer, she’s bombarded by her brother’s flustered: “You advised my darling niece to seek council from our mother? Do you hate her? Because I’m assuming you must. What possessed you?”

“It’s not like I locked them in a freaking basement with each other! God! Excuse me for hoping they’d bond!” 

“Sweet, naïve Alexis. Your incandescent outlook, while truly admirable, conveniently neglects my early elementary introduction to show business. Second grade? _Into the Woods_? Remember?”

“Um, David? I was four. So, no. No, I don’t. Maybe you can, like, fill me in on your trauma?”

“My role as Milky White contained no dialogue and exactly six lines of stage direction. And yet, when the house dimmed, Mom had choreographed a tap solo and shifted ‘Hey Diddle Diddle’ into an operatic cadence. Just for me!”

“Okay, yes. It was possibly a smidge too soon to enroll Len in the dojo of Moira Rose. But she’s not scarred, so!” 

“Well, nerves of steel seem to be hereditary.” Alexis spends a beat kvelling at that ego boost before she tunes in again. “Listen, we’re about to grab dinner. Patrick has some wisdom to impart before I let you go, though?” Cutlery clatters and there’s a faint sizzle as David transfers her to his husband.

“Hey! Give Len my congratulations! The ‘Top of the Call Sheet Club’ welcomes her! Also? Your mom really does mean well, even if her methods are unconventional. _Cabaret_ wouldn’t have been anywhere near what it was without her. Stevie and I owe her a lot. Of course, we’re not impressionable youth, but. You get the point.”

“Message, like, totally received!" Alexis assures. “Love you guys!”

\----

To finish off her Thursday commute, Alexis calls Stevie. 

The main motive behind her brother-in-law’s reminder had been pretty unmistakable: ‘Cut Moira a break’. Alexis has always enjoyed a good meander, though, latching on to lesser-emphasized details. So her brain had blazed like freaking Diwali at Patrick’s casual mention of his co-star.

“Hi, lady!” Alexis bubbles when Stevie picks up. They chat for a while - swapping notable events from the stretch of existence between this conversation and its predecessor - before Alexis takes the dive: “What would you say to, like, Mr. Miyagi-ing Len on her journey to embodying a Schuyler sister?” 

“Am I the last resort?”

“Jesus, Stevie! Of course not!” Alexis gasps, genuinely shocked and affronted - mildly, at least - by her friend’s assumption. “I just figured that for my bitty Eliza to, like, reach her dazzlingly bright potential, she deserves to learn from the inimitable Sally Bowles.” She hurries to edit: “It’d be within your rights to tell me to, you know, fuck off. But maybe not that harshly?”

“I’m inimitable, huh?” Stevie laughs self-consciously. 

“The Hamil-talk has become a flood that I’m powerless to stop. Sorry. Don’t let the very specific wording distract you, though, because I couldn’t be more serious.”

Stevie goes quiet for so long that Alexis studies her bars curiously - very nearly impaling herself on a subway turnstile - guessing that she’s lost service in the station. But just as she’s poised to re-dial: “I can swing a couple sessions, if you’re sure that’s what you want.” 

“Um, yes, absolutely! You’re basically a life-saver! Consider me, like, eternally grateful and forever indebted!” 

\----

For the next month, Alexis sets her laptop up on the perfectly daughter-sized desk in Len’s room on Wednesdays and Sundays. She logs in to Zoom, hangs around until Stevie’s, like, gorgeous image materializes, lingers in the hall while the two of them collaborate. 

An utterly endearing scenario from their initial conference, some variation of which features in each of their ensuing consults:

“You know how in that story about the missing fish, the blue forgetful one repeats ‘Just keep swimming’?” Stevie wonders. 

Len nods eagerly.

“You do that too. But with singing. Oh! Also? You’re one hundred percent going to feel like barfing the first time you see how many people’ve bought tickets. Whatever you do? One: Don’t count them! It’ll only make you dizzier. Two: Keep all those snacks from concessions in your stomach. Three: You might be tiny, but you’re fierce - and this will be your moment. Don’t let anyone steal your glow, okay?” Stevie points at her mentee. “Especially not you.”

The way Len’s whole stage preparation saga’s shaping up, by the time the curtain actually rises, Alexis will have cried, like, all of her available tears. Those travel Kleenex with, like, fortunes on the wrappers? Yeah. She’s buying that entire shelf at Duane Reade. 

Just in case.

\----

On opening night, Alexis finds herself fighting a massively intense battle: attempting to curl Len’s hair - in an Off-Broadway storage closet, sans irreversible injury - when the poor thing hasn’t quit pacing for a single breath of the past forty-five minutes. 

“Sunshine? How about we, like, sit still for a sec?” she coaxes. “I’ll freaking hate myself if I burn you, you know?”

“Can we go home?”

“What?” Alexis almost, like, suffocates on her damn tongue, her flat iron misery totally eclipsed by Len’s plea. Crouching in front of her daughter, she brushes rogue blond wisps back into formation, her chest clenching when she realizes they’re damp – from sweat, saline, or some tear-jerking combo. “Oh, baby.” Sinking into lotus position on the questionably clean, thoroughly unforgiving floor, she pulls Len into her lap, murmuring, “You’re Supergirl, sunshine. Always.”

“You’re supposed to say that. You’re my mom,” Len stutters between sobs. “To everyone else, I might be horrible.”

“No chance! None!” Alexis kisses Len’s cheek. Then she stares at the wall, analyzes the ceiling, shuffles through her stupid internal reference guide, searching for a, like, more profound piece of support. Honestly, though? She’s really close to losing her shit herself. Len’s ‘brave little toaster’ aura is typically so solid that it’s responsible for ninety percent of the twenty grays that have - very recently - invaded Alexis’ regular shade. Len’s nerves of steel choose to go on vacay on the wackiest and worst occasions, though, and Ted’s significantly less bulldozey nature kindly temps in the interim. It’s, like, ridiculously upsetting.

“Need any help in here?” a familiar voice asks as the door creaks open a crack.

“Stevie!” Alexis and Len swivel to shriek in unison, at the top of their collective lungs. Len also erupts: “You’re here!”

“I am!” Shutting out the outside world, Stevie joins them on the floor. “Business slows down this time of year, and I’ve earned a break in the big city. Besides - ” Alexis watches Stevie, like, registering Len’s streaky, flushed face and dancing her touch across Len’s knee “ - Lennox-san’s debut qualifies as a must-attend.” She hesitates - debating whether or not to actually do whatever she’s considering doing next - before she leans forward and boops Len’s nose. Fuck, Alexis’ purse is too freaking far away for this! “Rule three, right?”

Len’s smile might be heavily drenched and bordering on microscopic, but Alexis is ecstatic that it even exists at all.

“Let’s clean you up!” Stevie instructs optimistically. “You’ve got a show to do!”

\----

Len delivers an inspired performance, Ted snaps so many pictures that his phone, like, follows in the footsteps of the Hamilton men, and Alexis’ preemptively-purchased blotters are used with great abandon by the extended Rose-Mullens fam – as well as several unorganized patrons in their row. 

When Len bounds over to her receiving line after her concluding bow, Ted lifts her off the lobby carpet and swirls her around. “You were d-Eliza-ful!” he gushes, pinning the ‘Helpless’ quill-pierced heart he’d gotten on Etsy to her hoodie. 

David and Patrick hold out a confetti monstrosity from Milk Bar, Jocelyn and Roland proudly model their matching ‘Include Women in the Sequel!’ wear, and Twy promises to treat her to the real deal once she’s a few years older.

Moira proclaims her granddaughter to have ‘flourished under my unparalleled, consummate tutelage - brief though our conclave was.’ In his struggle to not react to - or refute - their mother’s remark, David chokes on the patch of cake he’s pinched off. Patrick efficiently thumps her brother's spine while their father presents Len with a humongous bouquet of pink roses that, like, hides her whole torso.

Alexis and Stevie converge on their girl together, wrapping her up in a cloud of perfume, fancy fabric and, like, so much affinity. “Definitely Supergirl, sunshine!” Alexis cheers, swatting at the air above her daughter’s arm. “Right, Stevie?”

“Two thumbs sky-high,” Stevie rasps. 

Alexis passes her the final ‘Find Your Fearless’ tissue in her pack.


End file.
